Catrina Morrison's cheer camps a hit

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Dan Brown/Independent
Catrina Morrison (center right) and her coaches Sydney Preston, Anice Moore and Paiten Lineberger are members of the UCA staff, putting on cheerleading camps throughout the Southeast.

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Dan Brown/Independent
A total of 68 Berkeley cheerleaders participated in the three-day camp.

Former Berkeley track star Catrina Morrison is about to embark on a great adventure.

In town for the summer, Morrison has been conducting cheerleading camps with some former collegiate cheerleaders. On July 28-30, she filled the Berkeley Middle School auditorim with 68 of her former Stags cheerleaders for a three-day cheer camp.

“Working with Berkeley brought back so many memories especially since I was in those girls’ shoes a few years ago,” Morrison said.

While at Berkeley, in addition to being a cheerleader, Morrison and her younger sister LeAnna were the queens of South Carolina’s track kingdom, winning multiple team relay and individual championships during their time at Berkeley High School.

While LeAnna went off to run at UNC Charlotte, and now plays basketball, in addition to running track in 2015 at South Carolina, Catrina chose a different route.

She followed her cheerleading dream.

Catrina roamed the football sidelines at Clemson’s Death Valley for the past four seasons as a Tiger cheerleader.

“I love cheering and loved cheering for Clemson,” she said.

In May, Morrison’s career at Clemson concluded with a degree as she hung up her orange and purple cheerleading uniform for the final time.

Graduation did not sound the end of Morrison’s cheerleading career. Instead, this was just the beginning of her next great adventure.

While waiting to begin work on her master’s degree, Morrison spent the summer pursuing her two favorite pastimes by conducting cheerleading camps throughout the Southeast.

“This summer I traveled to Florida, Georgia, and North Carolina to teach about 12-to-15 different camps. It’s such a fun job because I get to do my two most favorite things in the world, cheering and traveling.”

Morrison is a Universal Cheerleaders Association (UCA) instructor. More than 1,500 instructors make up the UCA staff and they are chosen based on skills, personality and their ability to teach.

“Instructors travel all over the Southeast to teach cheer camps to high school students,” she said. “I’m very passionate about cheering and also helping other girls to become just as great as I was with cheering in high school and college.”

Locally, Morrison is a cheer coach at the new Elite Sports athletic facility in Moncks Corner. She said coaching would be something she’d be able to do while she completes her master’s degree in Social Work or Clinical Mental Health Counseling.

She is excited about where the road might lead.

“It’s just the beginning of an exciting life for me,” she said. “My plans are to work with children that either have behavioral problems such as conduct disorder and oppositional defiant disorder or to work with children who experienced some type of maltreatment whether its sexual, emotional, physical, or psychological.”

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